One man's journey to understand The Bachelor.

Week 4 – I’m so above and beyond this

noun
a Greek word meaning, the practice of claiming to have moral standards or beliefs to which one’s own behavior does not conform while speaking in a voice that makes others want to punch their own ears off.

On a show with parasailing, group hot tubing, bug eating, cradle robbing, and a grandpa’s dying, there is one friggin voice that trumps it all. One voice that says desperate things while at the same time talking about how being desperate is beneath it.

Watching this show right now is like sitting down to enjoy a waffle only the waffle is covered in fart and the fart is insecure and won’t stop using clichés to condescend everyone within ear shot. I don’t want another waffle. I just want the fart to go away.

We get a one-on-one on the lake and then into a private concert with Lanco,…you know, Lanco? You’re in Tahoe and you’ve already hiked and golfed and maybe gambled. What else is there to do? Lanco, that’s what.

A bunch of women go into the woods for some outdoorsy fun times where we meet two guides with Targarian hair.

Me thinks they did that to make Arie look younger.

Peeing in bottles! And then drinking it? They pull an apple juice prank and it’s the best! Then it’s bug eating time?? Fantastic! A bunch of game girls and one you just want to leave for the bears.

Questions are asked. Women have to face their fears. We haven’t seen this type of toughness since Sean Astin was left for dead by Kevin Bacon in White Water Summer.

Krystal describes the scene as “high school”. What high school did Krystal go to? I never found myself in a hot tub with 8 women. If they went on a date in a basement and watched Saved By the Bell the College Years while wishing they were doing something more dangerous on a Friday night, then that would be more “high school”.

But there is justice in the world. Krystal’s rival gets the group date rose and we all high five.

Arie and Becca M take the second one-on-one and everything is going great until he finds out just how young his date is. It was set up perfectly with quotes from Arie like, “Are you still into going out?” Little does he know Becca’s only been able to go out for a year. Chances are high she still has a fake ID in her clutch! The bomb is dropped and you can see the, “am I going to jail for frenching this chick?” all over Arie’s face. But he keeps her around and we are all uncomfortable.

No time for a cocktail party, let’s get straight to the rose ceremony. Wait, what’s this? Krystal sees an opportunity to annoy everybody? Let’s do it! The women sit down because they know it’s gonna be awhile.

Brittany and Claire go home and we’re a little surprised because Claire had some things going for her. But there are no time for questions because all we want is to go to bed and try to get Krystal’s terrible voice out of our heads.

Let’s move on to the women for a closer look at how things went this week. And remember the key. Ladies who have just been booted are in blue because they’re sad. Ladies who left a while ago are in red.

Ouch. Annaliese leaves the mansion giving us two of the most memorable weeks in the show’s history. Hats off for at least trying, but hats gently off. I think Annaliese could be traumatized by aggressive hat-taking-off.

This year’s, “wait who is that in the back row? Oh, and she just got a rose?” Ashley has had no camera time and she’s headed straight for a one-on-one with zero chemistry and Arie looking like he’s got a migraine.

Slow week for Becca K. but she does manage to be relatable by announcing how sweaty she is at the rose ceremony. It’s perfect “Next Bachelorette” stuff.

The age thing comes out and there’s no going back. We also learn that Bekah is a mountain climber. Where have we seen this before?

It all goes back to Cliffhanger. Everything goes back to Cliffhanger. Will Arie be able to connect romantically knowing how young Bekah is? Or will he pull her aside at the next cocktail party, give her “Oh The Places You’ll Go”, kiss her forehead, and send her on her way? I don’t know what the best answer is for Arie I’m just glad I’m not in his shoes.

Ask any former lady wrestler and they’ll tell you, Bibiana’s mom can’t spell. Poor girl was made for the first two weeks of a reality dating show but not for anything more. She leaves us, broken. Watch for her to talk way too much at the Women Tell All.

It was obvious. She had no screen time. We weren’t even sure we had the right Brittany. But she was pretty wonderful when signing off, telling us that she’s hopeful for the future and doing it through tears. One of the better walkouts in the show’s history. Hat’s off, Brittany. Oh, the places you’ll go.

I’m a little shocked. She seemed charming. The other sane women liked her a lot. Did Arie see her as a sister? Was it just not there? Caroline was a voice for the people. Usually the narrator cast member has no shot at winning but Caroline was different. This show just keeps us guessing. I think we’ll see more of Caroline. Maybe, in Paradise.

Another unexpected week from someone we all agreed was terrible. Chelsea does a spot on impression of Krystal, she embraces the outdoorsy challenge, she listens to Marikh while Marikh is being redic. Maybe we were wrong about Chelsea. Stay tuned to find out.

People seem to like Jacqueline. My wife has her going far and gals in the office are also drawn to her. I just see an 80’s soap star. You could tell the funniest joke to Jacqueline and she would respond with the face you’re seeing in her headshot. But what do I know?

She crazy.

You can tell by the way the make out that Arie is into Kendall. He abandons his patented “old woman teaching people how to throw a pot on a pottery wheel” technique of face-touch kissing. It’s like he’s overwhelmed by the passion. Kendall is nutty and maybe nerdy. She’s not everybody’s cup of tea but she could be right for Arie…to date for a while and then wake up and realize he’s surrounded by dead animals. You throw dead animals into the mix and the passion turns into terror pretty quickly. It’s like Kendall is studying the shape of Arie’s head and wondering what it would look like on a wall. Eep.

The fart on a waffle. Krystal straight up sucks. She’s delusional and I wonder if seeing herself suck on TV will change her at all. I get that she hasn’t had good role models to help her not suck but man. You can only reason so much when you’re in a cloud of fart. At some point you just have to acknowledge that it stinks and go to another room. To her credit, Krystal is amazing at being terrible. Not only does she say the stupidest things but she takes forever to say them and that eternity is spent with the worst voice in the show’s 18 year history. I’m just waiting for the day she’s making a benign toast and everybody just leaves the room in the middle of it.

Lauren won’t eat worms but she’s charming in her denying them. I could see LB in the final four fo sho. I think she’s nerdy enough for Arie and unless something goes down, she could be there at the end.

You know things aren’t going well for you when a Bachelor actually eats the food. But Lauren gives us both the meltdown and the realization that she’s melting down. It’s actually refreshing to see a woman with enough self-awareness to know that she’s going down in flames. I could see Lauren S coming back for Bachelors in Paradise or just living nicely in the real world, far away from wine country.

Legit bummer. I feel really sad for Maquel and hope everything went ok for her family, losing her grandpa. It’s a lame way to get called off the show. Thing is, she’s better for it.

Somehow, Marikh gets a rose despite being overly concerned with her hair. That’s all we got from Marikh this week and yet she gets a rose and Caroline doesn’t. What are we missing with Caroline? Is she a white supremacist? Or worse, does she have chronic bad breath?

To quote Lando Calrissian, Seinee truly belongs here with us among the clouds. Because she’s graceful and went parasailing. It’s better when Billy D. delivers it.

Yes! Tia calls out Krystal for being horrible and gets rewarded with a group date rose. Another lady who will go as far as Arie will let a brunette. The day a man opens the door and grabs Krystal’s roller bag and the women rejoice will be a great day for all of us. Tia is at the front of that line. She’s goofy and she’s falling for Arie. It’s everything he wants except for his own mother’s face.

And that’s all for this week. Until next time, think about dating someone 14 years younger and how painful it would be when they didn’t get your Saved By the Bell the College Years references.